


Ready

by Smiley5494



Series: English Assignments [1]
Category: Original Work
Genre: Death/Grim Reaper come to take a soul, English assignment, First Person, Implied/Referenced Suicide attempt, Original Character(s), the afterlife
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-21
Updated: 2020-03-21
Packaged: 2021-02-28 21:22:43
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death, No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 545
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23243965
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Smiley5494/pseuds/Smiley5494
Summary: He is ready.It is time.And I am waiting.
Series: English Assignments [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1671247
Comments: 2
Kudos: 2





	Ready

He is ready.

I stood, watching. I saw him sit down in the cold concrete bus stop, alone. He opened today’s newspaper, the special April 1995 edition, forehead creased in worry, his eyes hollow and unfocused as he stared at the paper, determined to at least read a word.

The man, Robert Crane, wasn’t smiling. To anyone else he would seem to be waiting for a bus, but I knew better. He was wearing dress pants and a button-up plaid shirt, sleeves rolled up to his elbows, shoes tied almost effortlessly. Robert had the look of a formal business man, his sleek brown hair combed to the side.

He is ready.

He is dying.

He is anxious to see his wife and newborn child again, after they died in a car accident a year ago.

I am the Grim Reaper.

I am Death.

I am here for him.

And he is ready.

* * *

Nearly nine months ago, he tried to push his appointment forwards. His soul wasn’t truly ready, so I did not come. I have taken special interest in him since then, it is rare to have a mind ready but a soul yearn for life.

Slowly, as to not startle him, I crossed the empty road and sat down next to him. He looked up form his newspaper, the last one he would ever read. Taking in my white, hooded cloak, accented with gold twine and ever shifting physical appearance, he smiled.

He knew who I was.

I greet him calmly, with a smile. He doesn’t ask how I know his name.

“Is it time?” He asked cautiously. I breathed a sigh of relief, usually they scream and cry. Begging me not to take them. That it wasn’t their time. They were wrong, they always were.

“Yes,” I say, holding out my hand for him to take, “are you ready to go On?”

His soul takes my outstretched hand. His large, calloused ones smothering my tiny, soft ones. The soul of Robert Crane peers down the street, impatient. A bus pulls onto the curb, he lets got of my hand to get on. His physical body slumps onto the bench, dead, letting go of the newspaper.

I walk on after him. The bus driver, a young adult wearing a silvery-white hood cloak, a Reaper, one of my helpers, waves him to the back of the bus where those closest to him sit. His wife sits next to him, holding their son. His mother, Elizabeth, on his other side. She is a stern but fair woman, when she speaks her voice wavers with barely suppressed emotion; “You have been so brave, my son.”

His wife, Laura, a joyful young lady, holds his hand, and kisses his cheek. She shows him their baby, who had grown so much in the last year. Laura tells him all about their home in the afterlife. His parents, grandparents and friends all tell him what to expect when they got there, what On is like. I sit up the front by the Reaper, listening to the conversation going on in the bus. Then, silently, with a slight prompt, the bus starts to move.

He is dead.

It is time to go, On is waiting.

He is happy.

He is ready.


End file.
